Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Malnutrition?

"The cash-strapped government of Kim Jong Il, which struggles to maintain and buy fuel for its aging tanks and armor, has concluded it cannot win a conventional war, according to U.S. and South Korean military officials." [this of course before the death of Kim Jong Il!]

Decades now from the historians will be asking the question as to WHY the North Korean even when possessing what seems at least on paper an overwhelming military advantage, NEVER did attack the ROK [Republic of Korea], destroy by a blitzkrieg style offensive the South Korean army and those American military units permanently station in the south.

The desire often and most vociferously so expressed by the communist leadership in Pyongyang to unify the Korean peninsula with communist domination and USE MILITARY FORCE TO DO SO!

Again for over a period of three decades now the NKPA [North Korean People's Army] on paper having a demonstrable and frightening advantage over South Korean and American military forces, and yet, NO attack ever came. And WHY?

The answer is perhaps, pure, plain and simple, MALNUTRITION?

Decades of antiquated and antediluvian agricultural policies have created long-term food shortages, MALNUTRITION THE NORM RATHER THAN THE EXCEPTION, at least an entire generation of North Korean youth growing up stunted and almost dwarfish, food shortages and hunger endemic! This is so?

Anecdotal accounts seems to suggest that this is so? NO ONE doubts the ability of the NKPA to START a war, but perhaps there is a definite and realized impossibility to maintain the pace and tempo as required by the blitzkrieg to an ultimate conclusion. Again, plain, pure and simple, the physical wherewithal is LACKING?

"U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Thursday North Korean IQs are feared to be falling due to prolonged malnutrition."

"'There's a concern that their IQs are going down because of malnutrition and insufficient diet,' . . . 'People in the North Korean military...are 4 foot 10 inches (145 centimeters), these are men, and less than 100 pounds (45 kilograms)'." [this according to Rumsfeld]

"It is clear that the all-powerful army - once quarantined from food shortages and famine - is starting to go hungry."

"'Everybody is weak,"'says one young North Korean soldier.'Within my troop of 100 comrades, half of them are malnourished,' he said."

And THERE IS PRECEDENT FOR THIS! German troops and industrial workers in the munitions sector during both World Wars unable to maintain the pace, hunger prolonged creating NOT conducive to operations that require a rapid tempo, advance thwarted!

1. "Erwin Rommel . . . often bemoaned the demands placed upon his poorly fed troops'. The Allied blockade of the German Empire . . . was responsible for food shortages and widespread malnutrition in Germany and allied countries. When inadequate provisioning was combined with the gruelling night marches preceding the battle of Caporetto, a heavy toll was extracted from the German and Austro-Hungarian forces."

2. "On the eve of World War I, in 1914, the annual death rate from accidents among workers at the Krupp Essen plant was 4.1 per thousand employees, a figure that by 1917 had risen to 8.7 per thousand, as the tempo of production increased, while employee health deteriorated from malnutrition and overwork."

3. That German 352nd Infantry Division as defending the Omaha beach head, 6 June 1944, comprised primarily to teenagers who had suffered malnutrition, SOLDIERS FELT TO BE INCAPABLE OF NOTHING FURTHER THAN DEFENSIVE OPERATIONS, PHYSICALLY UNFIT FOR FURTHER AND MORE INTENSIVE DUTY!

"manpower problems . . . The replacements, mostly teenagers, were physically unfit for all but limited military duty, because of food shortages in Germany."

That is all there is to it? That populace of North Korea has been for decades now incapable of military action as would be needed to initiate and more importantly sustain an offensive of major proportions the defeat of ROK and US forces in the south the goal? That is all there is to it? This is just one mans' opinion.